System and Method for Real-Time Location-Based Advertisement Insertion into Online Content

ABSTRACT

There is provided a media content server for inserting a location-based advertisement into an online media content. The media content server comprises a memory including an online media content for online access; a processor configured to receive a request from a client for the online media content; determine an IP address of the client based on the request; map the IP address to a local advertisement server serving an area corresponding to the IP address; request a local advertisement from the local advertisement server; provide the local advertisement to the client; and provide the online media content from the memory to the client. The online media content has a first and second sequential segments, and the local advertisement may be provided to the client after the first segment is provided and before the second segment is provided.

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION

1. Field of the Invention

The present invention relates generally to electronic circuits andsystems. More particularly, the present invention relates tocommunications systems for transmission of digital data.

2. Background Art

Television broadcasters often serve two different advertising markets, anational market and a local or affiliate market. Since the broadcast oflocal television signals is handled by local affiliates that onlybroadcast to a specific local area, it is straightforward for affiliatesto sell targeted advertisements to local businesses interested inadvertising locally. This model provides mutual benefits in the form ofincreased revenue opportunities for affiliate television studios andincreased visibility for local businesses.

Recently, the increasing availability of broadband Internet connectionshas enabled new methods of real-time media delivery such as Internetstreaming video. The worldwide nature of the Internet provides numerousbenefits by breaking down physical and geographic barriers, but at thesame time poses challenges for content providers in providing relevantand local advertising. Although users may voluntarily provideinformation regarding their location, the additional hassle of providingthis information may deter users from accessing the content at all, andthe accuracy of such user-volunteered information may be questionable.Thus, many content providers customize the advertising content based onvariables stored in a server providing the content, rather thaninformation volunteered by the user.

For example, one method of customization is to provide separate distinctwebsite domains, each domain providing local content for each locality.This method requires the user to manually select the correct localdomain. The user might know the name of the local broadcaster and searchfor the website by that name. Alternatively, the national broadcastermight have an entry page allowing users to select a local broadcasterwebsite on an image map. In either case, the user is required to takeadditional inconvenient and error-prone steps to find the proper localbroadcaster online.

Another common method of customization is to build a profile of thewebsites that a user commonly visits, then tailoring the content ofadvertisements to be relevant to the visited websites. This method isoften implemented using a third party cookie technique, whereby a thirdparty server tracks the website visiting habits of a user through acookie. However, applying this technique to provide local advertisingrequires numerous preconditions to be met. First, the user must visit asignificant number of websites with local content corresponding to theuser location. Second, those websites must utilize the same third partyadvertising company. Third, the third party advertising company mustoffer geographically targeted services to regional advertisers, andretain advertisers operating in the same location as the user. Meetingall these preconditions concurrently may prove to be difficult.

Accordingly, there is a need to overcome the drawbacks and deficienciesin the art by providing a way to present locally customized advertisingcontent in real-time Internet applications without requiring undueeffort and inconvenience from users. Users thus benefit from advertisingmore likely to be of interest, local advertisers benefit from affordableexposure to targeted markets, and content providers benefit fromadditional revenue streams.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

There are provided systems and methods for real-time location-basedadvertisement insertion into online content, substantially as shown inand/or described in connection with at least one of the figures, as setforth more completely in the claims.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

The features and advantages of the present invention will become morereadily apparent to those ordinarily skilled in the art after reviewingthe following detailed description and accompanying drawings, wherein:

FIG. 1 presents a real-time location-based advertisement insertionsystem, according to one embodiment of the present invention;

FIG. 2 presents a real-time location-based advertisement insertionsystem, according to another embodiment of the present invention;

FIG. 3 presents a block diagram of an online content stream withadvertisement insertion by a content server avoiding the same categorycode from a first and second advertisement server, in accordance withone embodiment of the present invention;

FIG. 4 shows a flowchart describing the steps, according to oneembodiment of the present invention, by which a content server canprovide real-time location-based advertisement insertion into onlinecontent; and

FIG. 5 shows a flowchart describing the steps, according to oneembodiment of the present invention, by which a content server canprevent the insertion of advertisements belonging to a same categoryfrom a first advertisement server and a second advertisement server.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

The present application is directed to systems and methods for real-timelocation-based advertisement insertion into online content. Thefollowing description contains specific information pertaining to theimplementation of the present invention. One skilled in the art willrecognize that the present invention may be implemented in a mannerdifferent from that specifically discussed in the present application.Moreover, some of the specific details of the invention are notdiscussed in order not to obscure the invention. The specific detailsnot described in the present application are within the knowledge of aperson of ordinary skill in the art. The drawings in the presentapplication and their accompanying detailed description are directed tomerely exemplary embodiments of the invention. To maintain brevity,other embodiments of the invention, which use the principles of thepresent invention, are not specifically described in the presentapplication and are not specifically illustrated by the presentdrawings.

FIG. 1 presents a real-time location-based advertisement insertionsystem, in accordance with one embodiment of the present invention.Real-time location-based advertisement insertion system 100 includescontent server 110, client 120 within geographic area 130, affiliate adserver 140, national ad server 150, geographic IP database 160,affiliate database 161, and client database 162.

For the present example, content server 110 might comprise a web serverincluding a processor and a memory. The processor handles all the logicrequirements of the server, including data communications with otherInternet connected devices. The memory might contain prerecorded videomedia files of popular television shows formatted for Internetstreaming. Alternative embodiments might include streaming radio, anonline game with in-game video advertisements, a live video camera feed,and other forms of streaming or interactive entertainment. Although onlyone content server is shown, alternative embodiments might use multiplecontent servers to handle the bandwidth requirements of supportingmultiple concurrent users. Client 120 might then represent a personalcomputer running a web browser or any other computing device. A usermight use client 120 to access content server 110, desiring to catch thelatest streaming video episode of “Misplaced.” Geographic area 130encompasses client 120 in FIG. 1, where geographic area 130 mightcorrespond to a ZIP code, a city, a set of coordinates, or some othergeographical classification, such as longitude and latitude.

Affiliate ad server 140, which might also be referred to as a local adserver, serves advertisements to a specific area, which corresponds togeographic area 130 in FIG. 1. Alternative embodiments might includemultiple discrete geographic areas in the specific area. Also, thephysical location of affiliate ad server 140 might be far removed fromthe specific area served, since affiliate ad server 140 can beaccessible from any Internet connection. This might be the case ifservers are consolidated in one location or remote datacenters are used.National ad server 150, in this embodiment, provides advertisements forthe entire nation without regard to location. In an alternativeembodiment, national ad server 150 might simply have a broadergeographic coverage area than affiliate ad server 140, such as a largemetropolitan city area versus a single zip code area, respectively.

Each of these ad servers also contains a processor and a memory muchlike content server 110, with the memory containing advertisementmaterials from sponsors. Since the present embodiment involves streamingvideo, these advertisement materials might comprise prerecorded videosegments intended to play during program content. These advertisingmaterials might be presented using the traditional method of breakingprogram content into a first and second sequential segments, withadvertisements inserted in-between the segments. Alternatively, theadvertising materials might be overlaid on top of the actualprogramming. This overlay might be implemented using a transparent videowindow or a video banner area adjacent to the programming. Analogously,an ad server providing advertising materials for an Internet radiostation might include advertising clips to be inserted between songs ormixed directly into an audio mix.

Geographic IP database 160 links IP addresses to geographic areas;affiliate database 161 links geographic areas to affiliate ad servers;client database 162 links clients to profiles containing informationabout the associated user, including a user submitted location. Theserelationships help content server 110 establish the correct affiliate adserver 140 to serve client 120 based on the detected geographic area130. The process of establishing this chain of relationships shall bediscussed in conjunction with FIG. 4 below.

Moving to FIG. 2, FIG. 2 presents a real-time location-basedadvertisement insertion system, in accordance with another embodiment ofthe present invention. FIG. 2 is similar in layout to FIG. 1, butincludes multiple geographic areas, multiple clients, multiple affiliatead servers, and a category code exclusion list. More specifically,real-time location-based advertisement insertion system 200 includescontent server 210, client 220 a within geographic area 230 a, client220 b within geographic area 230 b, affiliate ad servers 240 a and 240b, national ad server 250, geographic IP database 260, affiliatedatabase 261, client database 262, and category code exclusion list 263.

Many of the elements in FIG. 2 correspond to elements in FIG. 1. Contentserver 210 corresponds to content server 110. Clients 220 a and 220 bcorrespond to client 120. Geographic areas 230 a and 230 b correspond togeographic area 130, although they each represent distinct areas.Affiliate ad servers 240 a and 240 b correspond to affiliate ad server140. National ad server 250 corresponds to national ad server 150.Geographic IP database 260 corresponds to geographic IP database 160.Affiliate database 261 corresponds to affiliate database 161. Clientdatabase 262 corresponds to client database 162. One new elementintroduced into FIG. 2 is category code exclusion list 263, which shallbe discussed in more detail with FIG. 3 below.

FIG. 2 presents an extended embodiment of the real-time location-basedadvertisement insertion system from FIG. 1, the system now servingmultiple clients in different geographic areas. Although geographicareas 230 a and 230 b could conceivably fall within the purview of asingle affiliate ad server due to, for example, close proximity, itmight be assumed that geographic areas 230 a and 230 b are distantenough to warrant independent affiliate ad servers as represented byaffiliate ad servers 240 a and 240 b. For example, geographic area 230 amight represent Los Angeles, Calif., while geographic area 230 b mightrepresent Detroit, Mich. Advertising clients for affiliate ad server 240a might include a local surfboard manufacturer, whereas clients foraffiliate ad server 230 b might include a local snow shovelmanufacturer.

The system of FIG. 2 works similarly to FIG. 1, but content server 210will be able to distinguish between clients 220 a and 220 b and theirassociated geographic areas and affiliate ad servers. Additionally, thepresence of category code exclusion list 263 allows the system of FIG. 2to prevent advertisements from different servers from conflicting witheach other, which shall be discussed in conjunction with FIGS. 3 and 5below.

Moving to FIG. 3, FIG. 3 presents a block diagram of an online contentstream with advertisement insertion by a content server avoiding thesame category code from a first and second ad server, in accordance withone embodiment of the present invention. Online content streamenvironment 300 includes content server 310, affiliate ad server 340,national ad server 350, category code exclusion list 363, and onlinecontent stream 370. Category exclusion list 365 includes category codeA. Online content stream 370 includes content 371, ad 372, content 373,and ad 374. Ad 372 belongs to category code A, and ad 374 belongs tocategory code B.

FIG. 3 also includes several corresponding components from FIG. 2.Affiliate ad server 340 corresponds to affiliate ad server 240 a or 240b. National ad server 350 corresponds to national ad server 250.Category code exclusion list 363 corresponds to category code exclusionlist 263. Content server 310 corresponds to content server 210.

Online content stream 370 of FIG. 3 is assembled in real-time by contentserver 310. Continuing with the “Misplaced” example above, content 371and 373 might represent the first and second half segments of aMisplaced episode. National ad server 350 provides ad 372 belonging tocategory code A. Affiliate ad server 340 provides ad 374 belonging tocategory code B. As noted, content server 310 will be able to preventads 372 and 374 from using the same category code, and that processshall be discussed in conjunction with FIG. 5 below. Although onlinecontent stream 370 is depicted as a sequential series of discretesegments, ads 372 and 374 might also be overlaid on top of content 371and 373, as previously noted. This might be desirable to prevent theskipping of advertisements by embedding the advertising within theactual content, increasing the chances that the viewer will actuallywatch or read the advertisements. Additionally, although ads 372 and 374imply only a singular advertisement in FIG. 3, alternative embodimentsmight include multiple advertisements from different sponsors. Thesequence of steps to assemble online content stream 370 will bediscussed in conjunction with FIG. 5 below.

FIG. 4 shows a flowchart describing the steps, according to oneembodiment of the present invention, by which a content server canprovide real-time location-based advertisement insertion into onlinecontent. Certain details and features have been left out of flowchart400 that are apparent to a person of ordinary skill in the art. Forexample, a step may comprise one or more substeps or may involvespecialized equipment or materials, as known in the art. While steps 410through 450 indicated in flowchart 400 are sufficient to describe oneembodiment of the present invention, other embodiments of the inventionmay utilize steps different from those shown in flowchart 400.

Referring to step 410 of flowchart 400 in FIG. 4 and real-timelocation-based advertisement insertion system 100 of FIG. 1, step 410 offlowchart 400 comprises content server 110 receiving a request foronline content. As previously discussed, a processor embedded in contentserver 110 will likely process this request and all other logic andnetwork operations. One embodiment might comprise an exchange of dataover the Internet using the Hypertext Transfer Protocol (HTTP), whereclient 120 is executing a web browser and content server 110 isexecuting a web server application on the processor. In the presentexample, client 120 requests a streaming video episode of the televisionseries Misplaced from content server 110.

At step 420, content server 110 determines the Internet Protocol (IP)address of client 120 sending the request for Misplaced. The web serverapplication executing on content server 110 can be configured todetermine this IP address, as incoming Internet data packets fromclients will include information concerning the originating IP address.Although this IP address may not always correspond to the user's true IPaddress due to proxy servers, router network address translation, IPspoofing, and other potential network routing issues, for a majority ofusers the source IP address will remain relatively static. The potentialwidespread adoption of the next generation IPv6 versus the current IPv4may also inspire more confidence in the reliability of the source IPaddress.

At step 430, content server 110 maps geographic area 130 to the IPaddress obtained from step 420 by using geographic IP database 160.Geographic IP database 160 might be provided by a third party sourcethat specializes in IP address intelligence, analyzing the entire validIP address space and attempting to accurately map each IP address to aparticular geographic area or some other data criteria. Content server110 will then be able to look up the IP address associated with client120 and identify that client 120 is operating from geographic area 130,since geographic IP database 160 has previously identified that the IPaddress or range of IP addresses corresponds to geographic area 130.

Alternatively, the information provided by geographic IP database 160may fit into a hierarchy of geographic location data, used inconjunction with a user registration system. Users accessing contentserver 110 may be required to register first, volunteering demographicdetails such as location. These details might be stored in clientdatabase 162, accessible to content server 110 once a user is logged in.Then, when content server 110 accesses geographic IP database 160, itmay also access client database 162 and make a decision as to whichlocation to use. If, for example, the location associated with the userprofile has a high confidence of accuracy, being previously used in ane-commerce transaction or matching with the IP database location at thetime of registration, content server 110 may give greater deference tothe user profile, attributing an incongruent IP location with atraveling user or network routing issues. On the other hand, if contentserver 110 suspects that the volunteered geographic information isinaccurate, for example referencing a blatantly fictional name or city,it may prefer to ignore the associated user profile and rely on the IPdatabase lookup instead. However, if content server 110 does not requireregistration, it may need to fall back to IP database lookup as the soleprovider of location information for unregistered users.

At step 440, content server 110 associates geographic area 130 retrievedfrom step 430 to affiliate ad server 140 serving a specific area byusing affiliate database 161. The owners of content server 110 may alsolikely administer affiliate database 161, since the data pertaining tothe broadcast coverage and target markets for each affiliate or localbroadcaster will likely be most readily accessible from the contentprovider itself, which might represent, for example, a major nationaltelevision network. Once affiliate database 161 is properly setup, itwill map a particular geographic area to an affiliate responsible forthat geographic area, and vice versa. Thus, content server 110 mayrequest affiliate database 161 to provide the affiliate ad server thatis responsible for serving geographic area 130, and affiliate database261 will reply by associating affiliate ad server 140.

Although in this particular example, affiliates appear to be responsibleto geographic areas in a one-to-one relationship, alternativeembodiments may have an affiliate responsible for multiple geographicareas. As previously mentioned, this might be due to the geographicproximity of certain geographic areas. For example, one affiliate adserver might serve two nearby cities. Similarly, multiple affiliates maybe responsible for the same overlapping geographic area. This might bethe case, for example, near state borders. Residents in Michigan mightreceive Ohio based advertisements, and vice versa. In this situation,content server 110 might be programmed with a policy to prefer aparticular affiliate, balance coverage among the multiple affiliates, orsome other rationale, depending on business priorities. Additionally,although the local advertisement servers are referred to as“affiliates,” they do not necessarily need to be affiliated with alarger owning entity. The word “affiliate” as used here is to emphasizethe local service area of the servers.

At step 450, content server 110 contacts affiliate ad server 140associated from step 440 with a request for a local advertisement. Thisrequest might also include category exclusions, which will be detailedwith FIG. 5 below. Depending on the desired network arrangement andmethod of advertisement insertion, the local advertisement request mayfurther instruct that the local advertisement route back to contentserver 110 first before being provided to the client. As shown in FIG.1, two paths are available to client 120 from affiliate ad server 140:one is a direct path, and the other uses content server 110 as anintermediary. In the direct path, affiliate ad server 140 will directlystream the local advertisement to client 120. This reduces the workloadand bandwidth requirements for content server 110, since it only needsto pass an instruction to affiliate ad server 140 to provide the localadvertisement to client 120 directly. For example, a media playlistserved to client 120 by content server 110 might be appended with aproper local advertisement reference pointing directly to a videoadvertisement provided by affiliate ad server 140. However, this methodcan be somewhat less flexible, as content server 110 cannot manipulatethe advertisement data since it reaches client 120 directly.Alternatively, content server 120 might retrieve the local advertisementfrom affiliate ad server 140, and then serve the local advertisement toclient 120. Although this intermediary method might consume morecomputing and networking resources than the direct reference method,content server 120 can now manipulate the advertisement data. Forexample, content server 120 might overlay the advertisement data overthe requested content, making it more difficult to isolate and removethe advertisement data and more likely that the user will view theadvertisement.

At step 460, the local advertisement is provided to client 120. Whetherthe advertising content is served directly or through content server110, it will be requested and provided on demand to client 120, inreal-time. An advertiser will want some assurance that paid advertisingimpressions are actually accessed from start to finish. Although usingcompleted advertisement playback as a metric does not catchcircumstances where the advertisement is not viewed even though it isplayed, such as when the user steps out for a break or is otherwise notviewing the media player, it is at least a quantifiable action that canbe recorded. Additionally, since the advertisements are served during orin-between sequential segments of the requested media content ratherthan only at the beginning or end, there is a greater chance that theuser will actually pay attention to the advertisements. Thus, affiliatead server 140 will provide advertisements in real-time and will recordadvertisement impressions in real-time after an advertisement isfinished.

Content server 110 can also serve advertisements from ad servers otherthan affiliate ad server 140. National ad server 150, for example, mayprovide advertisements for advertisers that wish to promote theirservice or product nationwide. There may also exist differentgeographical hierarchies of ad servers. For example, ad servers mightexist at the local affiliate level, then at the state level, then at theUS region level such as the West coast or the Midwest. A larger numberof geographical ad server layers might provide greater marketingflexibility for advertisers at the cost of increased maintenance andadministrative overhead for the content provider.

Content server 110 might distribute the frequency of ad server selectionbased on the relative importance of the served target market. Forexample, advertisers conducting expensive national advertising campaignsmight expect advertisements from national ad server 150 to be selectedmore often than affiliate ad server 140, and content server 110 mightarrange its server selection algorithm accordingly. Additionally,content server 110 might favor national ad server 150 over affiliate adserver 140 in the event of a conflict, which shall be discussed below inconjunction with FIG. 5.

FIG. 5 shows a flowchart describing the steps, according to oneembodiment of the present invention, by which a content server canprevent the insertion of advertisements belonging to a same categoryfrom a first ad server and a second ad server. This functionality may bedesirable to avoid a conflict of interest, such as the selection ofadvertisements from competitors in the same industry. Certain detailsand features have been left out of flowchart 500 that are apparent to aperson of ordinary skill in the art. For example, a step may compriseone or more substeps or may involve specialized equipment or materials,as known in the art. While steps 510 through 540 indicated in flowchart500 are sufficient to describe one embodiment of the present invention,other embodiments of the invention may utilize steps different fromthose shown in flowchart 500.

Referring to step 510 of flowchart 500 in FIG. 5 and online contentstream environment 300 of FIG. 3, step 510 of flowchart 500 comprisescontent server 310 receiving category code A from national ad server350. The decision to use category code A might be made by content server310 or national ad server 350, depending on the desired placement ofcategory selection authority. As can be seen by online content stream370, at step 510, content 371 has already been served to the user, andad 372 is in the process of being served to the user. However, theretrieval of a category code does not necessarily need to coincide withthe serving of the associated advertisement. For example, if the firstadvertisement, ad 372, were to originate from affiliate ad server 340instead, content server 310 might still access national ad server 350first to obtain a category code for exclusion. Content server 310 mightalso retrieve multiple category codes, for example due to multipleadvertisements with different category codes.

At step 520, content server 310 adds category code A to category codeexclusion list 363. This is shown completed by the presence of categorycode A within category code exclusion list 363. The category codeexclusion list represents a list of categories that ad servers with alower priority should avoid selecting advertisements from. Sincenational advertisers might be given preferential treatment over localadvertisers, national ad server 350 might be configured to have priorityover affiliate ad server 340 in the selection of potentially conflictingadvertisements at content server 310. Although FIG. 3 depicts only asingle category code exclusion list, there might be multiple exclusionlists if an advanced conflict management system is needed.

At step 530, content server 310 requests an advertisement from affiliatead server 340, the request specifying a category code excluded fromcategory code exclusion list 363. Much like step 510, either contentserver 310 might specifically request a certain category code, oraffiliate ad server 340 might choose a category code after being given acopy of category code exclusion list 363, depending on the desiredallocation of category selection authority. In the present embodiment,content server 310 provides affiliate ad server 340 a copy of categorycode exclusion list 363 containing category code A. Affiliate ad server340 examines the copy of exclusion list 363 and discovers category codeA, so affiliate ad server 340 thus selects a different category code B.An associated ad 374 under category code B is also served to the userafter content 373 in online content stream 370. Again, the provision ofad 374 does not necessarily have to coincide with step 530, although itdoes in this particular case.

At the end of step 530, a potential conflict of interest may bediverted, as the advertisements selected from affiliate ad server 340will not match the category code of advertisements selected fromnational ad server 350. For example, if category code A was beer, andnational ad server 350 retains a multinational beer company as anadvertiser while affiliate ad server 340 retains a local microbrewery asanother advertiser, following the steps of flowchart 500 would avoid theawkward situation of airing advertisements from both beer companies. Thesituation might be especially damaging if the advertisement from themicrobrewery compares the beer from the multinational beer companyunfavorably, citing its lack of flavor and body compared to the lovinglycrafted local microbrew. Thus, category code B might comprise deodorant,which is unrelated to beer and thus has little chance of conflictingwith advertisements selected from category code A.

The period of time that category codes will remain in category codeexclusion list 363 might also be managed in a way that minimizesconflicts while providing enough opportunity for advertisers to airtheir messages. For example, certain blocks of time or date ranges mightbe reserved for the national advertiser, leaving other time periods openfor affiliate advertisers. Alternatively, the scope of conflictresolution may be limited to merely the full playback of a single onlinecontent request, so that conflicts do not appear during a single episodeor session.

From the above description of the invention it is manifest that varioustechniques can be used for implementing the concepts of the presentinvention without departing from its scope. Moreover, while theinvention has been described with specific reference to certainembodiments, a person of ordinary skills in the art would recognize thatchanges can be made in form and detail without departing from the spiritand the scope of the invention. As such, the described embodiments areto be considered in all respects as illustrative and not restrictive. Itshould also be understood that the invention is not limited to theparticular embodiments described herein, but is capable of manyrearrangements, modifications, and substitutions without departing fromthe scope of the invention.

1-17. (canceled)
 18. A media content server for inserting alocation-based advertisement into an online media content to be providedto a client located at first geographic coordinates, the media contentserver comprising: a memory including a plurality of online mediacontents for online access, including a first online media content; ahardware processor configured to: receive a request from the client forthe first online media content; obtain the first geographic coordinatesof the client; determine a location of the client based on the firstgeographic coordinates; obtain a geographic area of the client based onthe location; associate the geographic area to a local advertisementserver serving the geographic area by using a local advertisement serverdatabase mapping a plurality of geographic areas to corresponding localadvertisement servers serving each of a plurality of geographic areas;request a local advertisement from the associated local advertisementserver, wherein the request for the local advertisement includes anexcluded ad category directing the associated local advertisement servernot to select the local advertisement from the excluded ad category;provide the local advertisement to the client; and provide the firstonline media content to the client.
 19. The media content server ofclaim 18, wherein the first geographic coordinates include longitude andlatitude.
 20. The media content server of claim 18, wherein the firstonline media content has first and second sequential segments, andwherein the requested local advertisement is provided to the clientafter the first sequential segment is provided and before the secondsequential segment is provided.
 21. The media content server of claim18, wherein the local advertisement is provided concurrently with thefirst online media content.
 22. The media content server of claim 18,wherein the first online media content is streaming video.
 23. The mediacontent server of claim 18, wherein the first online media content isstreaming audio.
 24. A method for use by a media content server forinserting a location-based advertisement into an online media content tobe provided to a client located at first geographic coordinates, themedia content server including a hardware processor and a memory havinga plurality of online media contents for online access including a firstonline media content, the method comprising: receiving, using thehardware processor, a request from the client for the first online mediacontent; obtaining, using the hardware processor, the first geographiccoordinates of the client; determining, using the hardware processor, alocation of the client based on the first geographic coordinates;obtaining, using the hardware processor, a geographic area of the clientbased on the location; associating, using the hardware processor, thegeographic area to a local advertisement server serving the geographicarea by using a local advertisement server database mapping a pluralityof geographic areas to corresponding local advertisement servers servingeach of a plurality of geographic areas; requesting, using the hardwareprocessor, a local advertisement from the associated local advertisementserver, wherein the request for the local advertisement includes anexcluded ad category directing the associated local advertisement servernot to select the local advertisement from the excluded ad category;providing, using the hardware processor, the local advertisement to theclient; and providing, using the hardware processor, the first onlinemedia content to the client.
 25. The method of claim 24, wherein thefirst geographic coordinates include longitude and latitude.
 26. Themethod of claim 24, wherein the first online media content has first andsecond sequential segments, and wherein the requested localadvertisement is provided to the client after the first sequentialsegment is provided and before the second sequential segment isprovided.
 27. The method of claim 24, wherein the local advertisement isprovided concurrently with the first online media content.
 28. Themethod of claim 24, wherein the first online media content is streamingvideo.
 29. The method of claim 24, wherein the first online mediacontent is streaming audio.